


Challenge Accepted

by domesticadventures



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Chopped, Cooking, Fluff, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-02
Updated: 2015-04-02
Packaged: 2018-03-20 20:42:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3664269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/domesticadventures/pseuds/domesticadventures
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>About halfway through the season, Sam pipes up during one of the appetizer rounds. “Another fucking salad? C’mon.”</p>
<p>Dean looks delighted. “I <i>told</i> you.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Challenge Accepted

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [jennytork](http://jennytork.livejournal.com/) for the [Supernatural Spring Fling](http://spnspringfling.livejournal.com/)~

The average episode of Chopped runs for forty-two minutes without commercials. It takes Sam and Dean two hours to get through the first episode of Chopped they watch together.

Dean starts watching by himself one Saturday morning when they’re between hunts, and his passionate shouting at the screen eventually draws Sam in.

They start watching together a few episodes into the first season. Dean pauses while the contestants are cooking to explain the premise to Sam. “So there are three rounds, right? Appetizer, entree, dessert. Each round has a few ingredients that have to be incorporated into the dish in one way or another.”

“Okay?” Sam says, clearly not getting the incredible implications. “That doesn’t sound particularly difficult.”

“Yeah, well, it’s all timed, too, so they have to rush to get everything plated before the clock runs out. And it’s not like you can just--” Dean gestures vaguely-- “toss everything on the plate. You’re supposed to _transform_ the ingredients.”

“Yeah, right,” Sam says. He sounds unimpressed, but he sits down next to Dean at the table nonetheless, watching as the contestants are introduced.

They make it all the way through the cooking phase for the appetizer round before Dean pauses again. It turns out Dean has about a thousand things he would have done differently. “First of all, no goddamn salads,” he says. Sam raises an eyebrow. “What? Serving the judges a salad during the appetizer round is just...Look, it’s just not something anyone should do, all right? Trust me on this.” Dean runs through a whole slew of possible dishes he could have made based around crab meat, mushrooms, grapefruit, and bran cereal, all of them sounding delicious and none of them involving iceberg lettuce.

“Wow,” Sam says. “I’m actually kind of impressed.”

“Did you forget all those years I spent cooking for you or what? Pretty sure I made about a hundred unique versions of mac and cheese. Not to mention the magic I could work with canned goods and a few spices.” Dean shrugs nonchalantly before pressing play.

The marathon goes a little faster with each new episode, when Sam and Dean start talking over what they quickly realize is rather useless narration. About halfway through the season, Sam pipes up during one of the appetizer rounds. “Another fucking salad? C’mon.”

Dean looks delighted. “I _told_ you.”

By the halfway point, Sam and Dean have both developed a hatred for truffle oil. Contestants inevitably insist on incorporating it into their dishes, always to ill effect. The fifth time it happens, Sam rolls his eyes dramatically, throwing his hands in the air. “Oh my god,” he half yells at the screen, “not the truffle oil again. The judges are going to hate it! Have you even _watched_ this show?”

They become increasingly judgmental as the marathon continues. Sam appreciates the artistry that goes into plating the dishes, but Dean cares more about the flavor, lamenting that he can’t taste the dishes himself and is instead forced to rely on the sparse comments made by the judges.

What really pisses Dean off, though, is that sometimes the contestants will use garnishes you can’t eat. “First of all,” he explains, “it’s fuckin’ wasteful. And second, it’s just pointless.”

Even Sam is on board with that, shaking his head at contestants using plain lettuce or parsley or rosemary in a desperate attempt to add interest to their dishes. “Not even I would eat that,” Sam admits. What bothers him even more, though, is when contestants use non-basket ingredients as the focal point of a dish or fail to transform ingredients at all, just tossing them on like an afterthought. “Seriously?” Sam says at one point. “You’re going to just throw the caramel candies straight onto the plate? Wow. Way to miss literally the entire point of the show.”

There’s a brief reprieve when they reach episode nine, where the appetizer ingredients are boxed mac and cheese, artichokes, and tilapia. “I would fucking rock this round,” Dean says. Sam nods his agreement.

They’re quickly back to their constant commentary after that, though. The contestants who are executive chefs tend to annoy Dean the most. Granted, not all of them are bad, but some obviously feel they’re entitled to be jerks to everyone else on the show, as if working at some fancy restaurant gives them free reign to constantly berate the other contestants, condescendingly reference their classical training at every available opportunity, and talk back to the judges.

Sam understands Dean’s annoyance, but what bothers him more are the melodramatic characterizations of the contestants. He refuses to believe these people really exist as they’re portrayed on the show, seemingly reduced to one key personality trait or motivation -- they’re bold, or they’re doing this to prove themselves, or they’re doing it for a dead relative, or they want the money so they can finally pursue their dream. Not that any of those things are invalid, but Sam has met so many people during the course of his life that he knows people can never be boiled down to one thing. People are hugely complex, and the idea that they’re forced into these narratives for the sake of entertainment offends him to his very core.

Sam and Dean get so caught up in marathoning the episodes, thoroughly enjoying them in spite of all their flaws, that they make it through the entirety of the first season without even registering the fact that over ten hours have passed and they haven’t eaten the entire time. It’s nearly midnight by the time they finish, and they’re hit with the sudden realization they were supposed to do the grocery shopping today.

When they make their way to the kitchen, all they can find is a single container of key lime yogurt, a sad-looking bag of wilted green beans, a half-eaten package of rainbow sour belt candy, and a few slices of sharp cheddar.

Sam looks dismayed, but Dean surveys the ingredients with a grin.

“Basically spent the entire day preparing for this,” he says. “Challenge accepted.”


End file.
